


Coming Home To You

by XtaticPearl



Category: Avengers Assemble (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Love Confessions, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-11
Updated: 2017-09-11
Packaged: 2018-12-26 13:33:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,280
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12060033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XtaticPearl/pseuds/XtaticPearl
Summary: “He chose not to come,” Sam blurted, too loud and too heavy before he swallowed a word, some word, “He said he won’t come back, Cap.”Steve had once drowned, felt water choke the air out of his lungs and sound out of his ears. He had once let water freeze into ice and ice freeze over his time. It had been gradual, slow and torturous, painful in every inch but Steve had done that. He had once died. It had been slow.He wondered if this was a quicker version of that.





	Coming Home To You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ishipallthings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ishipallthings/gifts).



“He’s not coming”

Steve knew those three words, he could hear them crystal clear especially in the dead silence it followed, but he couldn’t understand them.

“He’s back though,” he said, staring at Sam and brows crinkling in a frown, “Strange confirmed that he got him out. What - what’s the problem? Is something wrong?”

Strange had forbidden them from going to the Kamar Taj and they had camped out in the Tower till they got a signal from him - a plan nobody on the team had liked. Thor had gone into a furious rant about teammates and them having every  _right_  to be there before Natasha had taken him outside. Clint had gone quiet, adjusting his bow with a clenched jaw while Scott leaned against him firmly, shoulder to shoulder.

Steve had agreed. He had hated it but he had agreed. There was a voice in his head that suggested that he would have agreed to  _anything_  at that point if it meant bringing Tony back to this dimension and  _home_.

They had searched for him, tried to go through every way possible to solve the problem of bringing Tony back from his isolation over the past nine months but nothing had worked till Tony himself had found a way.

Strange had been their main point in this operation and he had cut off all technology and communication from Tony to focus his magic. Steve still heard and remembered the last words he had heard from Tony three days ago.

_I’m never leaving home again, okay? Not going out anywhere for at least a week. A week isn’t **never** , I know Clint, shut up. But I just - I’m staying, alright Cap? Just home._

Steve had recorded it in his mind. Every syllable, every pause and hitch. He could hear it now, running on a loop in his mind. Tony was coming home. He was  _staying_.

And now Sam said that he wasn’t.

“Did the plan not work?” he asked, knowing that they could figure it out. It didn’t matter, plans failed, people made mistakes and he was going to cry at night when nobody saw but it was okay; they would find a better way.

Sam’s eyes shifted, flicking to a blank-faced Natasha and back to Steve, a nervous tell that he hadn’t outgrown even though he wasn’t 17 anymore.

“The plan worked,” he said, taking a breath, “but Tony - he’s not coming.”

“What -”

“He chose not to come,” Sam blurted, too loud and too heavy before he swallowed a word, some word, “He said he won’t come back, Cap.”

Steve had once drowned, felt water choke the air out of his lungs and sound out of his ears. He had once let water freeze into ice and ice freeze over his time. It had been gradual, slow and torturous, painful in every inch but Steve had done that. He had once died. It had been slow.

He wondered if this was a quicker version of that.

“What does that mean?” he heard Clint ask, anger and confusion bleeding into the archer’s voice, “What the  _hell_  does that even mean?”

“Strange did what he was supposed to do,” Sam explained, shoulders drooping in exhaustion, “Tony was supposed to skip through three dimensions before he could get here and Strange helped him do that. But something happened, something happened in the third dimension and Strange cannot bring him here. Because Tony terminated the link from his end.”

“He needs us then,” Thor spoke up, eyes determined even as his fists were clenched, “He must be in trouble.”

“That’s the thing,” Sam looked like he wanted to look anywhere other than at Steve, “Tony told Strange he won’t come back before he terminated the link. It’s not - I heard the recording, Cap. He knew what he was saying. He knew what he was doing.”

“He still in trouble,” Hulk said, a scowl on his face, “He never asks for help.”

“Guys - he,” Sam sagged and took a shaky breath.

“He said he doesn’t  _want_  to come back,” he said quietly, “And he meant it.”

Steve knew that he should say something, ask something,  _do_  something. The team had begun shouting, arguments and anger pouring out to hide fear and despair. He knew that he should stop them.

He simply stood up and walked out, something freezing within him with every step.

-x-x-x-

It took three weeks before Steve broke.

He had come back from the gym and entered his room when he sensed the presence of someone. His fists clenched and he was ready when he heard it.

“Not switching on the lights yet?”

Steve had never told anyone but there had been something worse than freezing under ice. Something worse than feeling cold creep up into your body. It had been the feeling of the ice breaking. The mild stirrings of awakening that came with a rush of awareness that he was trapped, he was in a mass of ice, he was alive and trapped again.

He felt the ice of three weeks crack at the voice that haunted his mind and Steve felt his knees buckle.

“ _Tony_ ,” he whispered, hating this, hating the hallucinations that had begun, the reminders of nothing and everything. 

“Hey, Cap,” the voice said again and Steve didn’t fall, didn’t break but he slid down to the floor, his shoulder leaning against the nearest wall till his ass hit the ground. His knee connected with the dresser near by and a sharp noise echoed in the room but Steve didn’t care. He couldn’t care about anything more.

He was losing his mind and the ice was breaking inch by inch, making him feel something he had refused to feel for nine months and three weeks.

 _Alive_. It was the most painful thing to happen to him.

“Cap?” the voice,  _Tony’s_  voice asked, concern seeping into it, “What was that - JARVIS? Lights to full!”

Lights bathed into the room and Steve buried his head in his hands, shutting his eyes, keeping them closed against this hallucination that was determined to make him face a reality he didn’t want. A reality where what he wanted wasn’t there and he would have to accept that. Understand that.

“Cap?” the voice came closer, footsteps against the carpet, “Oh  _shit_ , Steve? Steve, it’s okay. Breathe. It’s okay, you’re okay. Come on, sweetheart, breathe -”

Steve couldn’t hold back the choked noise at the endearment because now he  _knew_  it was a hallucination, a cruel taunt to a broken dream.

“Shit, shit, sorry,” the voice cursed and became softer, closer, “I’m sorry, Steve, it’s okay, alright? I’m not going to do anything, okay? I’m not leaving. I’m not leaving here. I’m just going to sit here and breathe with you, okay? Just sitting here. I’m staying.”

Something snapped in Steve when he heard those words, the words Tony had said before he had lost everything. His eyes flew open, wild and furious but he stilled when they met the sight before him.

Tony crouched in front of him, sitting on his haunches, eyes concerned and dark circles under them. His hair was unkempt and he wore a ratty old t-shirt that had a small tear on the sleeve. His goatee was shabby and face tired.

But Steve had eyes only for Tony’s eyes. The eyes that were staring at him, brown and concerned and  _Tony_.

“Who are you?” he asked, trying to swallow his panic as his mind raced through possibilities, “Who  _are_  you?!”

Tony’s face fell but then his eyes turned thoughtful and a realization dawned on his face, horrifying and crippling in its wake.

“Steve. it’s me,” Tony spoke, his voice shaking but insistent, “It’s me,  _me_. I’m Tony, I’m not - I’m not a - JARVIS, scan me, now!”

“Scan confirmed,” JARVIS spoke up, “Identification: Anthony Stark.”

“Which universe?” Tony asked with his eyes fixed on Steve’s.

“Origin: Earth 12041,” JARVIS declared, “Born on May 29, 1981 in Manhattan. Parents: Howard Stark and Maria Stark (nee) Carbonell. Current designation: CEO of Stark Industries and Iron Man, Co-Captain of Avengers.”

“Other identifications”

“Main indicator and identification: Arc reactor model 2kve43. Eye scan confirmed. Other marks of identification detected: Scar from surgery of 2008, birthmark -”

“Stop,” Steve commanded, taking a shuddering breath before he repeated softer, “Stop.”

Tony stayed silent and Steve tried to get his breathing under control.

“How?” he asked when finally he was sure that he could speak without crumbling.

“Strange,” Tony shrugged, looking a little sheepish as he crossed his legs and settled down better, “I could open the link from there, with the Strange of  _that_ dimension and he contacted our Strange, It was all very Strange but - yeah.”

“ _That_  dimension?”

Tony’s face tightened and he sighed as he nodded.

“Yeah, Earth - 616,” he said, eyes dropping to his hands that lay linked over his knees, “It was - different.”

“You liked it better there,” Steve spoke up before he could rein in the words, bitter and angry and hurt.

Tony laughed, a broken sound that made Steve’s gut churn.

“I  _hated_  it there,” he said, looking up with a wry smile, “It was the worst kind of world I could imagine.”

“Why?”

“They,” Tony took a deep breath and shook his head, “they were one hell of a messed up group there. Everybody. All they did anymore was fight each other. Kill each other.”

“Kill?” Steve frowned and Tony let out a bitter laugh, something he  _never_  did when he was here.

“Oh yeah,  _you_ killed me,” he said casually before pausing, “Almost twice, actually.”

Steve felt his head spin and heart plummet. Something must have shown on his face because Tony winced and shook his head.

“No, just - it wasn’t you really,” he blew out a breath and shuffled till he could sit beside Steve, back to the wall, “There was this cube, a Cosmic Cube. It - changed you. Changed the parts nobody should have changed. Your mind, your heart.  _You_.”

“And I - this other me, Rogers? He killed you  -,” Steve let out a frustrated breath, “-  _Stark_ because of that?

Tony nodded slowly before launching into the tale. Steve stayed silent as he heard about a Civil War,  _two_  Civil Wars. Tony’s coma, an AI, Steve turned out to be Hydra, Steve destroying Tony’s AI, killing  _Natasha_ , trying to destroy Stark’s body.”

“And that’s where I entered,” Tony said, a stutter in his breath, “God, can I just say how much I hated him? I never thought I could hate anyone with your face, anyone who was you, but  _God_ , I  _hated_ him.”

“Why’d you stay?” Steve asked quietly, preserving the silence around them for a moment.

“Because,” Tony sighed and ran a hand over his face, “Because you needed me.  _He_  needed me.”

“ _We_  needed you,” Steve shot back, low and bitter and hurt but quiet.

“You had me,” Tony said and Steve looked at him finally, watching him smile sadly back at him, “You always had me, Cap. For all the nine months I wasn’t here, you had me. I wasn’t here but you never really let me go. You  _always_  had me.”

“Tony -”

“Rogers had nobody,” Tony laughed, sad and broken and regretful for a man who had killed his counterpart, “He had  _nobody_  and he didn’t even know it. He’d lost everything, destroyed everything with his own hands and he didn’t stop because he didn’t know to stop.”

“You hated him,” Steve reminded and Tony met his eyes head-on, intense and open, a heady mix of truth and something undefined.

“I did. I do. But  _he_  loved him,” he said, “Stark loved him. And I couldn’t - I couldn’t let his Rogers kills himself with this madness. I hated him but I knew, I knew that he was still somebody’s Steve. And ..”

“And?” Steve prompted, wondering about the bubble they were in, where something was solidifying even as things were fragile.

“And I knew that no Stark would want to be in a world without a Steve,” he said, too quiet, too raw, “I couldn’t let him wake up to the world like that. Not after having lived in such a world myself for nine months.”

“Tony?” Steve felt his eyes burn but Tony simply smiled, shuffling closer and placing a hand on Steve’s clenched one over the knee.

“I always wanted to come home, Cap,” he confessed, soothing even as Steve burnt, “This world, you are my home. I missed you. More than I could miss anything, anybody. And I thought that was because you’re my friend. Because that’s all it was.”

“But,” he leaned in and cupped Steve’s cheek slowly with a shaking hand, “I didn’t know what I felt till I saw what they had lost. I can’t - I couldn’t leave because I couldn’t let you break there. I couldn’t come back because I needed to bring him back. I needed to bring him back for myself. For Stark.”

“Why?” Steve whispered, leaning into Tony’s hand and trying to hold back his tears.

“Don’t you know by now?” Tony grinned, slow and painful and relieved. A ray of sunlight piercing through the cold. “Because Tony Stark is always in love with Steve Rogers, through every dimension and world. Because every Tony needs a Steve, a home to come back to. No matter how broken or different, every Tony needs his home. His Cap.”

Steve broke then and Tony caught him, he caught him like he always did, like every Tony of every universe did.

He caught him and reeled him in, to warmth, to himself.

He brought him back home.

The ice cracked and Steve found his breath again against Tony’s breath.


End file.
